#ron osborn

[lindseymcdonaldseyelashes]

Leverage 5x5 "The Gimme a K Street Job"

[mikyapixie]

𝙳𝚞𝚌𝚔𝚖𝚊𝚗 𝚂𝚝𝚊𝚛𝚛𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝙹𝚊𝚜𝚘𝚗 𝙰𝚕𝚎𝚡𝚊𝚗𝚍𝚎𝚛 𝙿𝚛𝚎𝚖𝚒𝚎𝚛𝚎𝚍 𝟹𝟸 𝚈𝚎𝚊𝚛𝚜 𝙰𝚐𝚘, 𝙼𝚊𝚛𝚌𝚑 𝟻, 𝟷𝟿𝟿𝟺, 𝙾𝚗 𝚄𝚂𝙰 𝙽𝚎𝚝𝚠𝚘𝚛𝚔!!

[90smovies]

[mashymilkiesinc]

Here’s a mess of items I am unearthing from the three seasons I directed on Duckman.  They are presented in no particular order.  And there will be more dumps in the future   (”Future Dumps” should be the name of my memoirs).

Some items of note:

2nd down from top:  A sample month of the post-production schedule for Duckman, or for any other animated TV series (then done on film). Each number (17, 18, etc.) represents an individual episode.  Each episode would arrive from the Korean animation studio as a “1-light” print (meaning is wasn’t color timed yet, just printed at one exposure.  The director would call his retakes from the 1-light and then sit with the film editor at a flat-bed editing console and edit the show by hand.  This was painfully time-consuming, especially if the note was something like speeding up animation from “twos” to “on ones”  which meant the editor had to hand-cut every other frame out and tape splice the remaining frames back together.  Film retakes would slowly trickle in from the Korean studio and edited in over time.  Once all the retakes and notes were addressed the film would be declared “LOCKED” (and you didn’t dare make changes afterwards or you’d screw up all the following processes).  Subsequently, a myriad of steps could proceed at once, activating a legion of technicians. 

The negative was cut and put through TELECINE (transferring it to video) and then ON-LINE (color correction, effects and credits added to build the final video product (all pre-digital, mind you).  These are processes that are nearly extinct now, due to digital media. 

Meanwhile, FOLEY (recording footsteps and such), sound effects (culled from the amassed libraries of post sound facilities ) and dialog tracks  are cleaned up in preparation for the mix.   Music cues were spotted with the composers and they went off to compose and record music (We also briefly had carte-blanche from the Zappa family to use “needle-drops” from any Frank Zappa tune we desired, because he was such a fan of Klasky-Csupo). 

Once all the audio elements were ready, we did a final mix which would last 4 DAYS FOR ONLY A 21 MINUTE SHOW!  That was a tense time when the Executive Producers would lay down the law on any of my fancy plans and wishes, damn them!  Finally all elements were reunited in the LAYBACK (the mating of final picture and final mix) onto videotape and sent to the network (in this case, USA); again, a pre-digital dinosaur process. 

Sometimes we delivered the layback to the network same day; hours away from airtime.

4rd down from top:  A full page color ad in Rolling Stone, April 6, 1995.

5th down from top:  A friend working on The Sacramento Bee sent me TV guide listing that renames the show in an inciteful way, March 26-April 1, 1995.

6th down from top:  A storyboard sketch for an unknown Duckman episode.  I think the artist is Director, Paul Demeyer.  But I’m not sure.

7th, 8th & 9th down from top: Items saved from my first Emmy Nomination for my Duckman Episode “TV or Not To Be.”  This was an eye-opening experience for me in more ways then one.  Animation does not get to be part of the actual, Prime-Time Emmys ceremony.  Those took place upstairs in the palatial theater of the Pasadena Civic on a different day.  Ours is a separate  “Technical Arts Emmys” ceremony carried on downstairs in the basement (I’m not kidding).  Duckman lost to a one-off PBS special called “The Roman City” that only had a few talky, static animated segments in an otherwise live-action documentary;  technically not even eligible for the category it won in.  My takeaway was that the winner, Bob Kurtz, a decent and talented animation veteran, was being honored for his career; a hidden calculus that determines the winner, rather than the actual nominated shows in competition.  So goes my education in show-business politics. 

Also included is a crib sheet one of the Executive Producers, Ron Osborn had ready just in case we won.  I think he started to tear it up and I took it from him.  Little did I know in 1994 that I could post it online in 2021!

Bottom image:  Something I drew, I assume for one of my shows, but it is very typical of the subversive imagery I loved to indulge in back then.

[cinematicwonder]

Meet Joe Black (1998)

“Death, who takes the form of a young man (Brad Pitt), asks a media mogul (Sir Anthony Hopkins) to act as a guide to teach him about life on Earth, and in the process, he falls in love with his guide’s daughter (Claire Forlani).”

Brad Pitt x Anthony Hopkins x Claire Forlani

Directed by Martin Brest

Screenplay by Ron Osborn,  Jeff Reno, Kevin Wade and Bo Goldman

Inspired by the play by Alberto Casella 

Inspired by the play by Walter Ferris

[lindseymcdonaldseyelashes]

Leverage 5x5 "The Gimme a K Street Job"

[lindseymcdonaldseyelashes]

Leverage 5x5 "The Gimme a K Street Job"

[90smovies]